Related papers: Lessons from Mayan Astronomy
The changing heavens have played a central role in the scientific effort of astronomers for centuries. Galileo's synoptic observations of the moons of Jupiter and the phases of Venus starting in 1610, provided strong refutation of Ptolemaic…
Over the last half-century quantitative stellar spectroscopy has made great progress. However, most stellar abundance analyses today still employ rather simplified models, which can introduce severe systematic errors swamping the…
It has been proposed that, since the origin of life and the ensuing evolution of biological species, a second evolutionary process has appeared on our planet. It is the evolution of culture-e.g., ideas, beliefs, and artifacts. Does culture…
This article looks at philosophical aspects and questions that modern astrophysical research gives rise to. Other than cosmology, astrophysics particularly deals with understanding phenomena and processes operating at "intermediate" cosmic…
Scientific discovery is mediated by ideas that, after being formulated in hypotheses, can be tested, validated, and quantified before they eventually lead to accepted concepts. Computer-mediated discovery in astrophysics is no exception,…
Recent advances in our understanding of the Universe have revolutionized our view of its structure, composition and evolution. However, these new ideas have not necessarily been used to improve the teaching of introductory astronomy…
For centuries, the rich nocturnal environment of the starry sky could be modelled only by analogue tools such as paper planispheres, atlases, globes and numerical tables. The immersive sky simulator of the twentieth century, the…
Historical materials are abundant. Yet, piecing together how human knowledge has evolved and spread both diachronically and synchronically remains a challenge that can so far only be very selectively addressed. The vast volume of materials…
Perhaps more than any other of the physical sciences, cosmology exemplifies the inevitable contact between science and philosophy, including the problem of the demarcation criteria that distinguish science from non-science. Although modern…
There are vast educational research works that highlight the serious difficulties that students present in learning astronomical subjects, as well as the prevalence of a traditional education distanced from the observational and…
Despite almost all being acquired as photons, astronomical data from different instruments and at different stages in its life may exist in different formats to serve different purposes. Beyond the data itself, descriptive information is…
Observational astronomy is the beneficiary of an ancient chain of apprenticeship. Kepler's laws required Tycho's data. As the pace of discoveries has increased over the centuries, so has the cadence of tutelage (literally, "watching over").…
Modern society has led many people to become consumers of data unlike previous generations. How this shift in the way information is communicated and received - including in areas of science - and affects perception and comprehension is…
We consider what is the best way to extract science from large surveys of the Milky Way galaxy. The diversity of data gathered in these surveys, together with our position within the Galaxy, imply that science must be extracted by fitting…
We attempt to provide a comprehensive model of evolution of science across millennia taking into account the contributions of other intellectual traditions, cultural value system and increasing in sophistication of humans in their study of…
The answers to fundamental science questions in astrophysics, ranging from the history of the expansion of the universe to the sizes of nearby stars, hinge on our ability to make precise measurements of diverse astronomical objects. As our…
How do galaxies form and evolve? This is one of the most puzzling questions in astronomy. Galaxy assembly takes place throughout the entire history of the Universe, but our understanding of it is hampered by the unfortunate fact that we can…
Astronomy has entered the big data era and Machine Learning based methods have found widespread use in a large variety of astronomical applications. This is demonstrated by the recent huge increase in the number of publications making use…
In an age of media saturation, how can astronomers succeed in grabbing the public's attention to increase awareness and understanding of astronomy? Here I discuss some creative alternatives to press releases, public lectures, television…
Cosmology is undergoing an explosive period of activity, fueled both by new, accurate astrophysical data and by innovative theoretical developments. Cosmological parameters such as the total density of the Universe and the rate of…